


A Hole in the Heart

by GrrraceUnderfire



Category: Hogan's Heroes (TV 1965)
Genre: Anxiety, Childhood Memories, Childhood Trauma, Gen, Grief/Mourning, Inner Strength, Mother-Son Relationship, Panic Attacks, Parent Death, Prisoner of War, Stalag 13, Stuttering, Stuttering Peter Newkirk, World War II
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-03-17
Updated: 2020-03-20
Packaged: 2021-02-28 22:48:51
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 5,313
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23185045
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GrrraceUnderfire/pseuds/GrrraceUnderfire
Summary: Newkirk wrestles with childhood memories of love and aching loss. How LeBeau came to understand Newkirk's difficult family history, and how Hogan gradually pieced together how to make Newkirk part of a team, scars and all.
Comments: 5
Kudos: 28





	1. Please Mr. Postman

An avalanche of letters had absorbed the attention of most of the occupants of Barracks 2 for most of the afternoon. Olsen, Garlotti, LeBeau, Addison, Belknap, Harper, Kinch, Carter, Abrams, Bartoli, Goldman, and of course Hogan, had all received sweet-smelling envelopes from wives and girlfriends and newsy updates from their families.

On days when everyone had news from home, it was painful to end up empty handed, but once again Newkirk shrugged off disappointment, took his football, and went out to kick it around with a smattering of other British prisoners. An hour later, Newkirk was back inside, sweaty and as cheerful as possible under the circumstances. That is, until he realized Carter was nattering about his letter.

“It’s hard to believe it’s been over a year since I saw my mom. It’s fourteen months, actually, now that I think about. Boy, I sure do miss her. I bet when I get home she’ll make me my favorite meal... pork chops with roast potatoes and applesauce and...”

“Dijon mustard is essential. And I am sure you miss her,” LeBeau said gently. “Fourteen months is a long time. But André, keep in mind that some of us have been here more than twice that long.” He cast his eyes over at Newkirk, halfway expecting an explosion.

“Th-three bleedin’ years,” Newkirk interjected. He sat down heavily on the bench and deliberately shook his football boots out right in front of Carter’s bunk. Dimwit, he thought, but he said nothing further.

“That is a long time, guys,” Carter said sympathetically. “I just miss family time, you know? Sitting and talking with my mom, doing little things to help her, making her laugh. I miss that a lot.”

"Of course you do,” Kinch said. “I think we all miss our families.”

“But mostly our moms. Because moms are special,” Carter persisted. He scrubbed at his eyes, homesickness etched on his face. Then he looked at the mess Newkirk had made.

“Hey, let’s clean that up, buddy,” Carter joked. “Your mom’s not here to clean up after you.”

The words were like a dagger to Newkirk’s heart. No, she wasn’t. His mum hadn’t been around for years and years—nearly 15 years, in fact. But he forced out a grin and nodded. “Sorry, mate, I’ll tidy up,” he said, rising to get a broom and dustpan.

A few minutes later, Newkirk was up on his bunk, loafing aimlessly while the other prisoners continued to chat about home. He turned on his side to face the wall and squeezed his eyes shut, determined to fit in a nap. Between an hour of brisk exercise in the cool air and the fatigue brought on by recent late night missions, he was asleep in no time, transported by his dreams.

_A feverish face, a roomy lap, a soft breast. He was small, very small, coughing while nestled in his mother’s arms as his big brothers and sisters rampaged through the snug flat._

_“Shh, now, children. Your baby brother is very ill and he needs to rest. Mavis, see if you can’t send Michael and Jamie outside to play and put Ellie and Lilly down for their naps, there’s a good girl. Ask Emily to sing to them, that will settle her down. And bring me a bottle for Peter, dear.”_

_“We haven’t any milk, Mum. Can you just nurse him? That always calms him.” Mavis replied. Only 12, she was mature beyond her years._

_“There’s hardly enough in me for Lilly,” Mummy sighed. She hadn’t been well or eaten much and her milk was drying up, even though she still had a one-year-old daughter to feed. “Water will do for him, then, and mix in a spoonful of sugar if we have it, love,” her mother replied, sounding exhausted. A moment later, Mavis was at her side, coaxing her brother, who was still a few months away from 3, to take the bottle._

_Jamie and Michael bounded past their mother and brother on their way to the door. “Oh, look at the little baby drinking from his bottle,” 11 year old Michael mocked. Jamie, just two years younger, laughed as they exited, slamming the door behind them. Peter shifted in Mummy’s arms, flinching at the sound of his brothers’ voices._

_“That’s enough, boys,” Mummy said wearily. “You were little once too.” She watched as they tumbled out the door. “Hush,” she whispered to Peter, holding him close as Mavis stroked his arm._

_Peter thought he might be getting too old for a bottle because Jamie and Michael said so, and Mummy and Mavis always tried to trick him out of it when he wanted it at bedtime. And he was getting so big—Mummy and Mavis and Emily and Ellie told him that all the time. But everything hurt and he wanted to melt into Mummy so she could hold him forever. And now_ she _wanted him to have the bottle, so it must be all right, even for such a big boy. He latched on and closed his eyes, and soon a cool, sweet drink was soothing his aching throat as it trickled down._

He woke with a start, feeling thirsty, then remembered where he was. He rolled over lazily and saw his team at the table with Colonel Hogan. The smell of coffee—well, not the real thing, but something approximating it—wafted through the air. He’d never had a cup of the stuff before he became a POW and wondered for a moment what the real thing actually tasted like. Probably something like fish stew, since LeBeau spoke of both coffee and bouillabaise in tones of loss and regret, he thought with a snicker.

“Glad you got some rest, Newkirk,” Hogan smiled up at him. “We’re discussing tonight’s plans, and I’ll need you again.”

“Thank you, Sir, I do feel more rested,” Newkirk replied. He sat up, yawned and stretched, then hopped down and slid onto the bench beside the Colonel, nonchalantly pushing Carter to one side before looking up at him with a grin.

“How’s your fffamily Carter?” His stammer was waking up now too. It usually took a few minutes.

“Everyone’s pretty good,” Carter beamed. “How’s yours doing?”

“What? Well, I d-didn’t get a letter this time, Carter, so I don’t ... know,” Newkirk replied.

“Yeah, but you were thinking about them. I could hear...” Carter began. Suddenly his lukewarm beverage tipped over. It was LeBeau who spilled it as he reached around him from behind to put a mug down in front of Newkirk.

“Sorry, Carter,” LeBeau said fiercely with a look that anyone but Carter would have promptly interpreted as “shut up right now.”

“Yeah, don’t mention that Newkirk was calling for his ‘Mummy’ in his sleep,” Harper chipped in from his perch at the stove, where he was pouring himself a cup of the acorn coffee.

“It was kinda sweet, actually,” Carter said, forging ahead cheerfully as he mopped up the mess with a cloth LeBeau handed him. Then he noticed that Newkirk was now on his feet, and spilling more drinks as he pushed away from the table.

“The funny thing is, he don’t even stutter when he says it,” Harper was saying just before Newkirk plowed into him. With his height advantage, Harper quickly got Newkirk in a headlock until Hogan stepped in to pry them apart. LeBeau pulled Newkirk away from the fracas as Hogan hauled Harper into his office for a dressing down. The lanky Texan seemed to have a homing instinct for any weakness Newkirk displayed and never missed a chance to remark on his stutter. Hogan had warned Harper and a few other men to back off on teasing Newkirk and his patience with them was running thin.

A moment later, Harper was back in the barracks room, head down and subdued, and it was Newkirk’s turn to be bawled out by Hogan.

He shuffled into the Colonel’s quarters sullenly, hands in pockets and head down. “Comportment, Newkirk,” Hogan said softly, prompting the Corporal to pull his hands out of his pockets, straighten up, and state, “Sir, sorry, Sir.”

“Sit,” Hogan said wearily, waving Newkirk to sit on his bunk as he pulled up a stool. They'd had far too many of these conversations, but Hogan couldn't blame Newkirk. As often as not, he was simply defending himself.

“You know what I’m about to say,” Hogan began. “So why don’t you just tell me yourself.”

Newkirk shrugged and made a start. “N-n-n-n...” he attempted. “N-n-n-n-n... N-n-n-n-n-n...” He was frustrated, embarrassed and badly stuck. His eyes glittered and pleaded with Hogan.

“You want help?” Hogan asked kindly. He hesitated to jump in when Newkirk was struggling, having learned that it was frustrating to any stutterer to be interrupted. But when it was just the two of them, there was a tacit agreement that it was all right for Hogan to help him break through a block. Newkirk nodded, so Hogan supplied the word. “No...”

“No fffffighting, Sir. Ignore him. P-p-p-put the mission fffirst. You’ll deal with any bullying or wisecracks,” Newkirk recited.

“Correct. Do you agree?

"Yes, Sir. C-completely, Sir."

"All right. Then why didn't you listen, Corporal?” His voice was kind, but firm.

“He cr-cr-cr-crossed a line, Sir.”

Hogan couldn't stifle his sigh this time. Newkirk had more invisible lines than any man he’d ever met.

“Newkirk,” Hogan began. “You have to try using your words and not your fists.” As soon as he said it, he saw Newkirk's face crumple and realized how impossible that advice must sound to him. Words could be so hard for him but his fists were extremely effective communicators.

“No Sir! No! He w-w-was t-talking about mmmmy Mmmum, Sir,” Newkirk said hotly.

The words “calm down” were about to tumble off Hogan’s lips, but he stopped himself, knowing those particular words would only trigger more upset. Instead, he simply took one of Newkirk’s hands and squeezed. At that touch, Newkirk was fighting to contain himself.

“You miss your mother,” Hogan said softly. He rose to sit next to Newkirk on the bunk and wrapped an arm around him. Sometimes he had to remind himself that many of these men were barely out of their teens and had never been far from home. Newkirk had been places, but he'd always had a female--his mother, his older sister, his circus family--to look after him. And he was just damned complicated.

Newkirk opened his mouth, but only a few gasping sounds emerged. Finally, he pushed through it. “...Y-Yes, Sir. Every day,” Newkirk replied.

Newkirk felt Hogan’s arm tighten around him again. God, yes, he missed her. Sometimes when he was sleeping, he could feel her wrapped tightly around him, as if she would never let go. But she had. She couldn’t help it. She had to go. It wasn't her fault.

Suddenly Newkirk’s head was wobbling, he was doubling over and his palms were sweating. “I’m thirsty,” he said with a big out-rushing of breath. “Please, Sir, could I have some w-w-water?”

“I’ll get it,” Hogan said quietly. He got up, went to the door, and gestured to LeBeau. A moment later, LeBeau was back, handing a glass to Hogan through the cracked-open door.

“Here you go,” Hogan said, sitting down beside Newkirk again and pressing the glass into his hands. “Drink up.”

But Newkirk’s hands were shaking. He looked at Hogan anxiously as the glass chattered in his hands and water started to spill. Without a word, Hogan took back the glass and held it to the Corporal's lips.

Newkirk closed his eyes and let his head tip against the Colonel’s shoulder as he took the sips he was offered. Hogan had his arm around Newkirk's waist, and Newkirk relaxed and drank again. The water had just a touch of sweetness and in this moment he was warm and safe. It was all right. Everything was fine. He took a deep breath.

But the moment didn't last; he couldn't let it. Newkirk straightened up self-consciously. He took back the glass and consumed the rest of the drink in two big gulps.

"S-sorry, Sir. I don't know what came over mmme. I ffffelt a bit dizzy all of a sudden," he said.

"It's OK," Colonel Hogan replied, looking at Newkirk with concern. "Do you feel all right now?" He looked at Newkirk's hands. "You're not shaking any more."

"Yes, Gov, I'm fine. I probably sh-sh-should have had some water to drink after I came in from all that running about," Newkirk assured his commanding officer. But inside he was scolding himself for panicking. _"Don't be so bleeding wet,"_ his inner voice was saying. _"Not in front of your mates, and certainly not in front of the Colonel."_

"OK. Well, go round up the other fellows and let's talk about tonight's mission in here," Hogan instructed Newkirk. The Corporal smiled and took off to perform his task while Hogan rose and began pacing, crossing his arms and looking concerned. That cold sweat had come on in the blink of an eye and vanished almost as quickly.


	2. I've Been Waiting Such a Long Time

LeBeau slipped into Hogan’s office as soon as Newkirk was gone.

“Mon Colonel, can I have a word with you about Newkirk?”

“Of course, LeBeau,” Hogan replied. “But talk fast. The rest of the guys will be back soon.”

Hogan suppressed a sigh. LeBeau was a real mother hen when it came to their resident pickpocket and thief, but he usually had good reason. As tough as Newkirk looked to most of the men, he had shown a different side of himself to LeBeau on many occasions before the Americans arrived in camp barely over a year earlier, and Hogan knew it.

“He’s brooding, Colonel Hogan,” LeBeau said rapidly. “He hasn’t had any letters from home for four mail calls in a row. That’s more than a month. Can you find out why the British prisoners aren’t getting their mail when the rest of us are?” He looked at Hogan breathlessly, his brown eyes pleading.

My God, Hogan thought, do they all have to look at me with puppy dog eyes? At moments like this, they weren’t even LeBeau, Carter and Newkirk. They were Brown Eyes, Blue Eyes, and Green Eyes. Thank goodness for Kinch—he was the only member of the team who didn’t have the power to make Hogan melt, or at least had the decency not to use it.

“It’s not all of the British prisoners, is it?” Hogan asked, frowning. He should have been paying more attention to this. He could swear he’d seen a few of the Scots waving around letters from home just that afternoon.

“I think it’s mostly the Londoners, mon Colonel, but there are a lot of them. And Newkirk is taking it very hard. He worries about his sisters even in the best of times, but when there’s no news…”

“It’s worse. Yes, I can see that,” Hogan agreed. “All right, LeBeau, I’ll look into it.”

At that moment, Kinch, Carter and Newkirk came tumbling into the room. The mission for the night ahead was straightforward: Rendezvous four miles from camp with Willy, the elderly Swedish underground agent who played a critical role in moving escapees down the line, to receive the contents of a locked briefcase. 

“I’ll do it, Sir,” LeBeau volunteered. Always eager for a mission, he spoke up because he’d met Willy and therefore he knew him on sight.

“I appreciate that, but this one’s on me, LeBeau, and I need you fresh tomorrow to route our package through the Gelsenkirchen cell,” Hogan said. “We’re dragging a civilian out of his home after midnight, and a foreigner at that. I need to be there in case any trouble erupts, just in case we need to improvise. Newkirk, you’ll be with me to open that briefcase. SS uniforms for both of us.”

“Yes, Sir,” Newkirk said. He grinned at LeBeau, who nodded reluctantly.

As the men scattered, LeBeau sidled up to Newkirk. “Be careful out there,” he said softly.

Newkirk lit a cigarette, handed it to LeBeau, and then lit another for himself. “I’m always careful, Louis, you know that. Come on, help me with the uniforms?” Together they head back to Newkirk’s sewing hut. Newkirk pulled garments off the rack and handed them to LeBeau, asking, “Do you have time to help me with the irons?” Pressing a German uniform to military standards was a time-consuming task that typically required three hot irons in rotation. LeBeau had never ironed before Newkirk got hold of him, but now he was pretty good at it, and he was good company to boot.

“What did Colonel Hogan say to you about Harper?” LeBeau asked quietly as they settled into their work. There wasn’t anyone else who could get Newkirk to open up quickly, so the job fell to him. He knew Newkirk wouldn’t be on top of his game if he was holding on to anger.

“Oh, the usual,” Newkirk replied. “ ‘Ignore him. He’s a b-bully. Let mmmmme handle it.’ All good and w-well, except when you’re the one b-being humiliated.”

There it was. Humiliated. Newkirk could slough off a lot of things, but humiliation wasn’t one of them. What man could?

“We all miss our families, Pierre. _Mais ta maman te manque le plus, mon pote._ _Quiconque a un cœur comprendrait cela.”_ He looked up, saw Newkirk struggling to translate, and smiled indulgently at his dearest friend. “Anyone with a heart would understand how much you miss your _maman_ ,” he said.

Newkirk let out a big sigh. “It j-j-j-just hits me out of the blue sometimes, Louis. Ffffifteen years is a long time to get used to a death. I should b-be over this by now instead of getting all sssoppy like a little g-g-girl.” _No wonder my brothers loathe me_ , he thought to himself. _I need to grow up and be a man_. “Anyway,” he continued. “Carter keeps talking about his mum like they’ve been apart ffforever. It’s been a bleeding year, and at least he’ll sssee her again and she sends letters and pictures.” He gulped. “At least he remembers w-w-w-what she looks like,” he said, his voice breaking.

LeBeau was at his side now. “Take out the picture,” he said gently.

Newkirk wiped his eyes irritably, annoyed with himself for losing his composure, but he did as he was told. He reached into his breast pocket and into the tiny pocket he’d sewn inside it. From there, he extracted a small photograph, folded in half and crinkled from wear. It showed a petite brunette woman with sparkling eyes, wearing a crisp dress and proudly holding a chubby toddler who leaned into her adoringly. Their eyes matched. No one else in camp but LeBeau had ever seen it.

“There she is. She’s very beautiful, and you are quite adorable,” LeBeau said, rubbing a circle into Newkirk’s back. “Take a nice long look so you’ll remember what she looked like and how much she loved you. Drink her in.”

“Drink her in,” Newkirk repeated as he gazed at the photo, finally allowing himself a small smile. “Drink her in.”

After a long while, he looked up at LeBeau and tucked the photo back into its hiding place. “The only reason I called her Mummy in my sleep is because I was little when she passed,” he said almost as if he was speaking to himself. “It's j-j-just a habit because that’s what I remember calling her. If I’d been older, I’d probably say Mum, but I never got the chance. Mmmaybe if Harper knew that, he’d bleeding well belt up about it.”

“Harper wouldn’t understand anything as beautiful and deep as your love for your mother, but I certainly do,” LeBeau said. “She’ll always be your Mummy. That’s how I think of her, too.”

“Then you can say Mummy when you talk to me about her, as long as w-we’re alone,” Newkirk said decisively. “But no one else has the right to do.”


	3. You Saw the Tears Standin' in My Eye

The mood in the barracks room was simmering that evening. Newkirk was in the middle of the action as usual, enjoying a game of cards and laughing with his friends at the table. But he was still smarting over Harper’s comments, and he shot withering glares at him every time the lanky Texan spoke or moved in his general direction.

Harper, meanwhile, was moping around the edges of the room and quietly grumbling to his pals, Bartoli and Belknap. Harper knew that although Newkirk had received a dressing down from Hogan, his lecture had been ten times worse.

Deep inside, Harper knew he was a jerk for picking on Newkirk for having that stutter, but he couldn’t stop himself. What kind of a dope had that much trouble talking? Anyway, it bugged him that a Brit had wormed his way into Hogan’s inner circle and was involved in the only exciting part of their dull lives. He wasn’t a bully, Harper told himself. And he also wasn’t a thief, a mama’s boy or a gosh-danged stutterer. He deserved better than Newkirk, but Hogan never paid him a lick of attention.

Kinch, seated at the table with Newkirk, noticed the friction, as he always did. When more than half of the barracks filed out to the mess hall for supper at 5 PM, Kinch was relieved to see Harper and his buddies leading the way, because he needed a word with Newkirk. Sometimes several men stayed behind to cook their Red Cross provisions instead of going to eat in the mess hall, but tonight only Hogan’s core team was dining in.

It wasn’t going to be anything fancy. LeBeau dumped a pile of root vegetables on the table in front of Newkirk, Kinch and Carter and nodded, which was their silent instruction to get busy if they wanted to eat. Carter immediately picked up a carrot and started hacking away.

“Carter, you’re going to slaughter those carrots,” Newkirk complained. “You d-don’t have to gouge them, j-j-j-just peel them. Look, like this, mate.”

He extracted his pencil sharpener, the sharpest knife in the place, and patiently demonstrated his peeling technique. LeBeau looked on with admiration.

“You’d make an excellent _legumier_ if you weren’t such a scoundrel, Pierre,” LeBeau teased Newkirk. “After the war, I will hire you for my restaurant and let you skip over _commis chef_ since you have already trained under me. If you work hard, you can be my _sous chef_ in a mere seven years.”

Game on, Kinch thought. He was right.

“And eat snails and fish stew for the rest of me life? No thank you,” Newkirk said with a smirk. “I’ll be too busy headlining at the Palladium in London, wearing smart clothes, and taking young ladies to tea at Claridge’s. A different one every day.” He dangled a long curl of potato peel in front of him, bouncing it up and down in amusement. “And I’ll eat fish and chips for my supper every bleeding night until I grow fins. Except for Sunday dinner, which will be roast beef and Yorkshire pudding with all four of my lovely sisters and none of mmmmy st-stupid brothers.” He grinned up at LeBeau, pleased with both the fantasy and the fact that he’d said all of that without a stumble, at least until his brothers entered his thoughts.

“Boy, that sounds perfect, Newkirk. And you sure miss your sisters, just like I miss my mom and my whole family,” Carter said. “But what’s up with you and your brothers? You don’t think much of them, do you?”

“Carter,” Kinch interjected. He raised his eyebrow while LeBeau stood behind him glaring and looking like he was about to smack Carter with his spoon. Not even Carter could miss the meaning of those gestures. He had just skated onto very thin ice.

“D-d-do you have brothers, Carter?” Newkirk asked evenly. He sounded calm, but his eyes were blazing.

“Sure, I have a kid brother, Joe. He’s 14, almost ten years younger than me,” Carter replied. “He’s my little buddy. I used to take him fishing and I taught him to climb a fence and hit a baseball and how to tie a knot. He’s gonna be an Eagle Scout soon, and I’m gonna miss the ceremony, but Mom promised she’d take a picture and send a copy to me. Gee whiz, I miss that little guy.”

Newkirk’s jaw hung down for a moment as he tried to square the happy picture Carter had just painted with his own miserable upbringing. Then he snapped it shut and found the words he was searching for.

“Well, J-J-J-Joe’s a lucky lad, then, to have a big brother like you, mate,” Newkirk replied. “I w-wasn’t as lucky.”

“Oh,” Carter replied, studying Newkirk carefully. “But… well… what do you mean? Were they busy with school or something? Because I know when I was studying I had to be sure and make time to play with Joe. Organic chemistry and calculus are hard, especially when you’ve got a seven year old bouncing around asking to play horsey and…”

Newkirk let out a bitter laugh and wondered what calculus was. “No. It was nothing like that. I didn’t want them near me.”

“Why not?” Carter asked, eyes wide. He couldn’t fathom why Newkirk would say that about his own brothers.

“ ** _Tais-toi_ , Carter.**”

“ **That’s enough**.”

The fierce orders rang out simultaneously from LeBeau and Kinch.

“It’s all right. He don’t mean nothin’ by it,” Newkirk said quietly. He looked up at Carter and offered a pained smile, one that didn’t go all the way to his eyes. “They were just bad to me is all, Carter. And that’s enough said about it.”

“All right. Well, if you ever do want to talk about it, I’m here. Because boy, I know how brothers can fight sometimes. My cousins Jim and Billy were at each other all the time but deep down they still loved each other and…”

Now Newkirk was cradling his head in his hands. “Yes, Carter,” he said softly. “I’m sure you do know.” He looked up suddenly. “Louis, could I have a drink of something, mate?” He rested his head on the table, trembling.

“Are you getting sick, Newkirk?” Carter persisted. He turned and saw Colonel Hogan standing in his doorway. “Hey, Colonel, I don’t think Newkirk’s feeling too well.”

Somehow Newkirk found the energy to roar at Carter. “The only thing I’m sick of is you talking,” he shouted. “Now shut the fuck up.”

“Hey, now,” a calm voice interjected. It was Kinch. He sat beside Newkirk as he slumped at the table and rested a firm hand on his back. “Harper and his pals got under your skin. Nobody can blame you for that--they're idiots. But you’re not going to take that out on Carter, are you? Hmm?" Newkirk shook his head miserably. "Then tell him you’re sorry,” Kinch said softly.

“I am,” Newkirk said sadly. “I am sorry, Carter. It’s not your ffffault. J-j-j-just stop with the questions, all right, mate? J-j-j-j-j…” He gasped and let out a small sob. “St-stop.” He took a deep breath and stilled himself again.

Carter stood by stunned as Kinch rubbed Newkirk’s back and LeBeau pushed a mug of water over to him. Newkirk lifted it shakily, sloshing it on the table.

In a moment, another hand was there, steadying the mug as Newkirk drank from it. Newkirk looked up, nodded gratefully at Colonel Hogan, and warned himself not to be a crybaby.


	4. Chapter 4

“I’m really starting to worry you might be coming down with something,” Colonel Hogan said as Newkirk drained the last drop of water from the mug. He placed a hand to his forehead and frowned. No fever. In fact, he was clammy and cold.

Newkirk sat at the table, arms folded across his chest, breathing deeply.

“More water, Pierre?” LeBeau asked.

Newkirk nodded. “Yes, please. Yes. Yes, I think I just need water, Sir,” he said, turning to Colonel Hogan. “It’s odd, but I feel perfectly ffffine now. Just very thirsty.”

“That’s twice today you got the shakes, Newkirk. Maybe we’d better have Wilson take a look.”

Newkirk rolled his eyes, but he knew there was no point in arguing. So he smiled instead and nodded and took another slug of water.

“All right, Sir. I’m sure he’ll ffff, fffff, ffffind I’m ffffff,fffffit as a ffffiddle,” Newkirk said, squeezing his eyes shut as he pushed through the words. Then he stopped and laughed. “Blimey, why don’t I quit when I’m ahead? The fffffirst F nearly did me in.”

Everyone laughed with relief. If Newkirk was making jokes at his own expense, how bad could things be? Then Carter broke in.

“But Newkirk, you said ‘fuck’ just fine,” Carter noted. At that, everyone laughed even harder. No one had ever heard that word trip off Carter’s lips.

“I always do,” Newkirk grinned. “It’s my fffffffavorite.”

“To say or to do?” LeBeau asked wickedly.

“Both, mate. Both,” Newkirk replied. “I believe I’ve mentioned Rita. And Vivian. And Caroline. And Mrs. Wexford, my landlady near the air base…”

The locker room banter was now in high gear, and LeBeau, Carter, and Newkirk were laughing up a storm. With a subtle nod Hogan dispatched Kinch to get Wilson.

**XXX**

“Thirsty, huh? I could check your blood sugar, but honestly, I don’t think diabetes is a consideration,” Wilson mumbled as he listened to Newkirk’s chest.

“Diabetes? What’s that?”

“Don’t worry. I’m 99% sure you don’t have it. I’ll check to be certain,” he said, rummaging in his kit for a syringe. “It’s a very simple test, one of the few things I can check for here in camp,” he added, humming with ghoulish cheer as he rolled up Newkirk’s sleeve and tightened a tourniquet around his arm.

“What the bloody hell are you doing, then?” Newkirk croaked. “Why’s that needle so big? Louis, make him stop! Colonel?”

LeBeau was no help at all. He could see that blood was being drawn and that was enough to turn him into a woozy heap of French invective. He collapsed on his bunk snapping out “merde” and “putain.”

“Was that really necessary?” Newkirk asked angrily as Wilson withdrew the needle from his arm. “And did you have to pinch me so ‘ard? That bleeding well ‘urt.” Hogan was now at his back, squeezing his shoulders to calm him down.

“What happens to your stutter when you’re mad, Newkirk?” Wilson asked. It wasn’t a joke or a poke. He was genuinely curious.

“It j-j-j-just goes away sometimes,” Newkirk replied with a shrug. “Kind of like Olsen. It drifts in and out like smoke.”

“Hmm,” Wilson replied, revealing nothing of his thoughts. “Well, you seem OK. I can get you a result on this bloodwork in a little while, but my hunch is that you’re just dehydrated, Newkirk. Make sure you’re drinking enough water. And eat, too, because you're too skinny and you can't live on cigarettes and coffee." He stood up and turned to Hogan. "Make sure LeBeau keeps after him about eating and drinking properly. He should be fine.”

“Sorry to w-w-waste your time,” Newkirk said sullenly. Then he brightened up, looked up mischievously at Colonel Hogan, then gestured across the room. “Check Louis before you leave. Maybe he needs to have blood drawn too.”

“ _Connard!_ ” LeBeau roared from his prone position across the room. “ _Trou de cul! Je vais tu affamer!_

“Naughty, naughty, Louis,” Newkirk replied with a grin.

Wilson shook his head and packed up his bag. On his way out the door, he nodded to Hogan. “A couple more glasses of water and he’ll be back to normal.” He stopped and considered his phrasing. “Well, as close as Newkirk gets to normal,” he added as he stepped out into the compound.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ummm, LeBeau has threatened to starve his best friend after calling him some obscene names. Nice, Louis. Really nice.


End file.
